Boy falls 100 feet into Lyndeborough gravel quarry

By NANCY BEAN FOSTERUnion Leader CorrespondentNovember 21. 2012 8:47AM
LYNDEBOROUGH - An unidentified teenager suffered serious injuries after a 100-foot fall into a quarry Tuesday night, and rescuers faced a difficult climb trying to get him to safety.

According to Lt. Rainsford Deware of the Lyndeborough Police Department, a call for help came in around 8:15 p.m. Tuesday for a 17-year-old boy who had fallen off a cliff in the Pike Quarry, located off Cram Hill Road in Lyndeborough. Deware said the quarry consists of several levels rising up from the main yard in Wilton into a hill in Lyndeborough.

It appears that the boy and four of his friends skirted the fencing that surrounds the active gravel quarry owned by Pike Industries and were "messing around" at the top ledge of the quarry, said Deware. The boy, 17, apparently slipped and fell 100 feet to the cliff below, breaking bones and sustaining internal injuries.

Rescuers including firefighters from Lyndeborough, Wilton and Milford, and police and ambulance personnel from Wilton and Lyndeborough had to access the quarry from the Wilton side, Deware said, and then firefighters had to climb up a series of cliffs to get to where the boy was lying.

"The firefighters climbed up to him, strapped him to a backboard, and then climbed back down," said Deware. "It wasn't easy."

When they got to the ground, a helicopter was waiting to fly the boy to UMass Medical Center in Worcester, Mass. Deware said it's not clear whether the boy's injuries were life-threatening or not. He is also not releasing the name of the victim because the boy is a minor.

The Lyndeborough Police Department is currently investigating the incident, and Deware said it hasn't been determined yet whether there will be any charges filed against the boy or his friends, whom he said were all under 17 years old.